Serral wins thrilling Starcraft II 2018 WCS Montreal

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Published on: 11/09/2018

Serral has dominated the Starcraft II stage with an iron fist throughout the season and he was the favourite to win the WCS Montreal. The fourth and final stop of the 2018 WCS Circuit series in North America which was hosted by DreamHack.

Starcraft II 2018 WCS Montreal Format

The tournament started on September 7 and concluded two days later. It all started with the first group stage when these 64 participating players were divided into 16 identical groups. Best-of-three matches decided the ones to advance to the second stage, as two players from each group qualified. All these games were played on September 7 and on the same day, action resumed with the second group stage, out of which only 16 players advanced to the next round.

On September 8, the third Group Stage started and by this time, all the weaker players had been filtered out, leaving the strongest competitors to fight for a place on the podium. In addition to the 16 players from the Second Group Stage, the eight groups featured 16 players from the qualifiers. They played in a dual tournament format and two of them qualified for the playoffs from each group.

Serral overcomes adversity to win Starcraft II 2018 WCS Montreal

Serral lost the first match against JonSnow but quickly returned to form to win the next three. uThermal and Reynor found themselves on the brink of elimination but found the resources to defeat Denver and Neeb in five thrilling matches. Just as many games were needed in the quarterfinals for Reynor to join TIME in the semifinals. TIME was unable to defeat Reynor, who qualified for another final.

Scarlett won the first two games in the playoffs, but had to play a decisive match to set up a confrontation with Serral in the quarterfinals. This time, she won the second and third matches, but eventually the Finnish player proved to be more than a match for her. The first semi-final was an all-Zerg affair and the multiple WCS winner emerged victorious at the end of five matches against Lambo.

Zerg players, and in fact all Starcraft II fans, were in for a treat, as Serral and Reynor needed seven games for a winner to be decided. The Finnish player won the opening match, but fell behind and needed to win back-to-back matches to win the Starcraft II 2018 WCS Montreal. Serral has been rewarded with a $20,000 prize and a seed at the WCS Global Finals.